that none of the other compilers cought... like feeding a const ref to an
auto_ptr... figures!

Can you be specific? There are several different (aged) auto_ptr
implementations, so it may not be the case that the others are in error

Well, maybe I'm missing something, but my understanding is that auto_ptr must be
able to delete the object that it manages. If so, it couldn't take a const ref,
unless it then casts away the constness in order to delete it.
But your very asking this makes me suspect that indeed I must be missing
something...
dan